15-19 High Street, Comber, Co. Down, BT23 5HJ

Two-storey terrace block at 15-19 High Street, Comber, formerly comprising three separate houses of possible pre-1834 origin, now greatly altered with modern shop fronts inserted and large brick returns of various ages to the rear.

The buildings occupy a sloping site on the north-west side of High Street. The front south-east façade is finished in painted lined render and features a long PVC sign board running above all ground floor openings. Number 15 (to the north-east) has a doorway set in a recess to the left with a modern partly glazed door; the original pilaster surround has been removed. To the right is a sash window with moulded surround and keystone, followed by a carriage entrance with flat arch head, in-and-out dressings and timber sheeted double doors with wicket gate. The first floor has three evenly spaced windows matching the ground floor pattern. Unusually, the window to the left belongs to Number 15 due to a 'flying lease', though it appears to be part of Number 17-19. An internally illuminated projecting PVC sign sits between the windows to the right. A tall panelled pilaster with floral capital marks the right-hand façade edge, with an eaves course above.

Number 17-19 has a similar front façade except its ground floor is completely occupied by a modern shop front with large windows. It has two windows to the first floor and a tall pilaster to the left-hand side.

To the rear of Number 15 is a large two-storey brick-built return, part hipped and part flat roof, with two windows and a door to the ground floor on the north-east face (the left with a sash frame, the right smaller with a PVC frame), and three windows to the first floor (the first and second with sash frames with Georgian panes of 6 over 6, the third smaller with a PVC frame). The exposed section of the main rear façade shows the rear of the carriage entrance and a sash window with Georgian panes (6 over 6) to the first floor, finished in plain unpainted render.

The rear of Number 17-19 is almost entirely obscured by a massive return, partly sandstone rubble-built in its older sections, with a modern extension currently underway.

Both properties have roofs covered in natural slate to the front and corrugated asbestos to the rear, with decorative red clay ridge tiles. Two yellow brick chimney stacks serve each property (the north-east stack of Number 15 is somewhat dilapidated). A rendered parapet marks the north-east end. Cast iron rainwater goods serve the front, with PVC to the rear.

Historical records show this site was occupied in 1722 and on all subsequently available maps. The 1834 valuation returns record three houses at this location—two belonging to Hugh Duncan and one to John Creggan—whose combined dimensions correspond to the present block and whose individual footprints are still marked by the present chimney stacks. While it is possible that this section of terrace originates from before 1834, the combination of late Victorian detailing and late 20th-century shop insertions has obliterated any architectural evidence of this history, both externally and internally. The ground floor has been given over largely to commercial use since the 1950s.